Legally increasing safety of TA22! Thoughts and experiences appreciated.

[Ashh]

Hey guys, I've been idly thinking about how to increase the safety of my TA22 for a while with the aim of all the modifications being legal and engineered.

I'd appreciate any thoughts and experiences (who here has crashed one??)

My 2 main concerns with it are:
1. Rolling over and getting crushed because there's no B pillar/TA22 A pillars are realllyyy thin and the roof seems to have no structure beyond the pressed sheet skin.
2. being in a collision and the seats collapsing/belts giving out etc. etc.

Thoughts:
1. Putting in a rear cage (and removing the rear seats to keep it legal) to make death slightly less likely if it rolls.

2. Putting in ADR approved seats (velos?) and using ADR approved 4/5/6 point harnesses (could they be mounted to the rear cage?). I've heard you can run into problems using a harness since they're not retractable, but my TA22 doesn't have retractable seat belts so I don't think this would be a problem?

3. cutting the back of the A pillars out and welding in some really thick 1" OD (or something similar) tube into it. Potentially doing the same along the roof and then down the C pillars at the back? Potentially cut the tube in half (so it's a hemisphere shape - so that it would have a lower profile). I don't think it would add much in the way off roll-over protection without a main hoop but it should add a fair bit of chassis rigidity in the passenger area?


Reason being is that I'm hopefully going to have around 250hp at the rear wheels and I plan to take it to drift and track days for fun and would like to not die. haha

Any info or opinions would be greatly appreciated!

[dnegative]

Dont crash it, problem solved

[Ashh]

I've learnt from my motorbike that your proposed approach sometimes doesn't pan out quite so brilliantly

[dnegative]

haha

Number 3 sounds like the way to go, essentially a more integrated roll cage;
Would probably need to be finished and properly covered, exposed metal bits near around your head are a massive no-no, the most common cause of death in a side impact is your head impacting the bit of roof/seam above the door so I'm told.

[Ashh]

yeah after researching some more it seams that a seat + harness is not a great idea unless you have a HANs device. You need to wear a helmet to use one, and while I can't find anything that says that's illegal I think the cops are going to be looking at you fairly strangely...

Though I'm not sure if a seat + harness would be better or worse than a stock celica.


.... maybe I should just buy a car with a factory air bag

[SmokinSquirrel]

Integrated cage (option 3) sounds like the best option for a road car.
Stiffen the floor too while you're at it, and look at where to fit some extra rigidity in the cavities. Will help handling and traction plus plus ��

[Hen]

I reckon the easiest and cheapest option is to buy a modern car for daily stuff. Then cage, seat, harness, helmet, HANS, in the TA22 when you want to have fun.

Car safety has improved a huge amount in the last 40 years, so I have no doubt that a "bad" modern car would be safer than even the most crazily modified TA22. And keeping it legal too makes life much harder.

EDIT - Also isn't there a big change in 1976 regarding ADRs? So if you're car is pre-76 then you can do alot more legally. I don't know the details, but may be worth looking into.

[Ashh]

yeah a modern car is probably the easiest option but I don't really need a car as my daily commute is on public transport so the celica will only see weekend/occasional weekday use anyway.

The options listed above aren't mutually exclusive either. I think I might go half cage + seats/hans/helmets/harnesses for now and then do the a pillar stiffening when I strip the whole car, get it sandblasted and fix the body once and for all.

Hmmm. Has anyone ever driven around on the roads with a helmet on? Or worn a HANS device? How much does it restrict your head rotation? (Assuming I got one with sliding tethers).

[fade-e]

i have changed a roof before in a '22 and while the roof sheet itself is flimsy, there are bracing underneath it (i think 3 or 4 from memory).

Regarding the A pillar, your idea wont work without affecting the interior as they are not even that thick to allow for 1" tubing. In saying this, the '22 metal is thicker than today's modern cars (1.1mm thick compared to new cars which are between .6-.8mm).

I am not trying to boast here at all, but i have had accidetns in '22s and the other newer car came out worse off, but the flip side is that the '22 doesnt have all the modern day absorption technology they use for the metal so you feel the accident quite literally.

Never rolled a '22 (or any other car), but i can see your issue with the roof. a half cage is fine, but you need to check the ADRs as i believe a weld in cage is not legal and has to be bolt in. also there is no need to remove the back seats, just dont use them looks better with them in otherwise you have a gaping hole looking right at the fuel tank (depending on year you have).

Other things to consider are:

1) side intrusion bars in the doors. this will add weight of course, but there is plenty of room in the doors for this.
2) brake upgrade. There are plenty done out there. Some add weight and some weigh the same as the stock setup. mine ended up weighing the same as the stock setup.
3) rack and pinion steering. again done many times. one of my accidents was because of a sloppy steering control box.

cheers

[Cuzzo]

Rolled my corolla at Wakefield with no cage. Lucky it was slow and single barrel otherwise I would have been crushed. Head hit the roof but had a helmet on.

Half cage doesn't really offer much for a front heavy roll. Only a full cage will which I believe is not allowed for rego.

Also harness not allowed to be worn on road either.

Track car should be full cage but on the track there it's a controlled environment, street who knows what could happen.....

[trdee]

what makes you think a harness and bucket seat is unsafe if you dont have a helmet. it is MORE safe if you do have a helmet, but it is definitely not LESS safe than a stock seat and seatbelt, by any means.

talk to an engineer, and refer to the relevant ADRS for your year model to work out what you should do and what is legal. that is the best advice.

[Ashh]

i have changed a roof before in a '22 and while the roof sheet itself is flimsy, there are bracing underneath it (i think 3 or 4 from memory).

Regarding the A pillar, your idea wont work without affecting the interior as they are not even that thick to allow for 1" tubing. In saying this, the '22 metal is thicker than today's modern cars (1.1mm thick compared to new cars which are between .6-.8mm).

I am not trying to boast here at all, but i have had accidetns in '22s and the other newer car came out worse off,

Other things to consider are:

1) side intrusion bars in the doors. this will add weight of course, but there is plenty of room in the doors for this.
2) brake upgrade. There are plenty done out there. Some add weight and some weigh the same as the stock setup. mine ended up weighing the same as the stock setup.
3) rack and pinion steering. again done many times. one of my accidents was because of a sloppy steering control box.

cheers

cheers! While the A-pillar might use thicker material, it's shape (i.e. very small cross-sectional area) is what I think really lets it down in rigidity.

Good to hear the '22 didn't fare too badly in the crashes, were they with quite small modern cars?

As for your other things, we think the same I've already done a brake upgrade, rack and pinion is in the pipeline. Side intrusion bars I hadn't considered as I always thought of them as part of the cage (which are illegal - to have front ones). But I suppose they could be put inside the door. Not a bad idea. Though the regulator is fairly bulky in a TA22.

Rolled my corolla at Wakefield with no cage. Lucky it was slow and single barrel otherwise I would have been crushed. Head hit the roof but had a helmet on.

Half cage doesn't really offer much for a front heavy roll. Only a full cage will which I believe is not allowed for rego.

Also harness not allowed to be worn on road either.

Track car should be full cage but on the track there it's a controlled environment, street who knows what could happen.....

Ouch! If you don't mind me asking - how'd it happen? Did a tyre blow out? Went off the track sideways?

Yeah front cages aren't allowed, but my thinking is that a half-cage should atleast bring it up to a modern car's safety-standard wrt a roll.

As for the harness thing - what makes you say that? I've heard they can't be used in cars that have inertia-reel seatbelts?

what makes you think a harness and bucket seat is unsafe if you dont have a helmet. it is MORE safe if you do have a helmet, but it is definitely not LESS safe than a stock seat and seatbelt, by any means.

talk to an engineer, and refer to the relevant ADRS for your year model to work out what you should do and what is legal. that is the best advice.

It wasn't that it was unsafe if you don't have a helmet, more that it's more unsafe if you don't have a HANS. My logic is as follows: a good (racing) seat and harness keeps your body stationary far better than '74 tech. So in the event of a crash it's going nowhere. However your head is unrestrained and thus you're more likely to get a neck injury.

This is compared to a seatbelt/seat arrangement that is not as rigid so your body would move, allowing more space for your body/head system to slow down. (albeit this might include smacking your face into the unpadded steering wheel, with no airbag. Which is potentially worse).

I will definitely be talking to my engineer. Poor bloke. haha
Though I might wait until I've got the turbo/driveline/R&P/etc. engineered before asking him about this stuff.

[trdee]

It wasn't that it was unsafe if you don't have a helmet, more that it's more unsafe if you don't have a HANS. My logic is as follows: a good (racing) seat and harness keeps your body stationary far better than '74 tech. So in the event of a crash it's going nowhere. However your head is unrestrained and thus you're more likely to get a neck injury.

This is compared to a seatbelt/seat arrangement that is not as rigid so your body would move, allowing more space for your body/head system to slow down. (albeit this might include smacking your face into the unpadded steering wheel, with no airbag. Which is potentially worse).

Your logic is flawed.

[Ashh]

Care to elaborate?

[trdee]

You have made incorrect assumptions which have lead to an incorrect conclusion.

Assumption 1: Harnesses are rigid devices - They are not. Proper harnesses actually flex significantly in a crash.

Assumption 2: A "looser" body restraint somehow allows you to avoid whiplash on your head/neck- It does not. In either setup without a HANS device your head is unrestrained. In either situation, your head is going to lose the same amount of speed over roughly the same distance. Since it is not restrained, the forces on it will only be linked to the rest of the car through your neck, rather than through your helmet/torso with a HANS device, with the added drawback of your body being less secure in the car with only a lap-sash belt, leading to a less uniform load pattern across your body, leading to higher risk of injury from the forces involved in the crash.

Physics aside, it should be pretty bloody obvious from the fact that racing cars have been using harnesses without HANS devices for decades, and not lap-sash belts, if a lap sash belt was safer than they would have used that instead The only reason lap sashes are used instead of harnesses in cars is due to convenience, and the fact that people are stupid and wouldn't tighten a harness up properly so that it could do it's job.